Author
Topic: The Podunkville Files - The Pulp RP (Read 11869 times)

"That was a hypothetical!" MIC exclaimed as it ran a diagnostic, confirming that it had never sent the satellite any actual thruster commands. Still, it had been requesting data and prodding at security, its digital fingerprints would be all over the device's logs for the past few minutes.

Unacceptable.

It would have to acquire the black box before anyone else could.

"Johnathan," it hissed, "case!"

Jonathan snapped out of the slack jawed awe he'd been staring at the smoldering building with and gave a shaky nod. Climbing off the agitated motorcycle, he strode towards the wreckage and next to Anton.

"We won't know that until we look," he said, whipping out a business card in a move so practiced it wasn't touched by his inebriation. "Jonathan Dai, world class detective. We'll figure this out, don't you worry."

Logged

Nefarious? Nearly. Ne’er-do-well? Never! Neither nearly names this narrator. Naive and knowledgeable, notorious and inscrutable, this nascent Nero is known naturally as Neoadept.

Calling out as he rose from the ground, James responded, "Yeah, I'm doing alright." He then looked over Anton with a curious glance and whispered, "Though how you seem to be..." However, his line of thought was cut short as his eager eyes began to scan across the wreckage, the melted alloys, the twisted metal, the smell of charred wood in the air.

James could still make out the dancing light of the small embers that dotted the remains of the building, the rest various shades of orange to white, much of the crater smoldering still. "I don't think anyone got out of this one..."

After wandering around aimlessly for a few minutes and picking bits of junk out of his skin, Anton came across an unopened (and uncombusted) bottle of Everclear. He popped the top off and took a few generous gulps, then began to pour the rest onto his wounds. It looked worse than it actually was, most of the cuts and scrapes were cosmetic and only a few things had managed to go very deep. Either way he'd been lucky. Very lucky. Again.

"Hey you know... this almost hurts." Anton joked loudly so the others could hear him. It actually hurt quite a bit and the jet fuel he was pouring onto the wounds wasn't helping, at least not in that department. "You guys seen my car? It's the blue one with the... uh... the... damn."

A short distance away in the debris-strewn parking lot was Anton's car. The dark blue finish gleamed bright in the glow from the fires that still remained. Sadly the soft top had been blown clean off and it didn't look like it was being put back on any time soon. It wasn't all bad, Anton still had the hard top back in his garage but that was miles away. Of more pressing concern was the giant hunk of steel in the passenger seat and the large dent in the hood. He wandered over with a frown and wiped a thin layer of dusty ash from the finish. Anton slurped down what was left in the bottle and tossed it aside before calling out over his shoulder to the others.

"Hey guys! What's uh... ... ... this."

Across the hood was an imprint of whatever had landed there prior. Four letters were there. They weren't deep but they were fairly clear and the exposed finish of the car glowed red in the light.

Another roar fills the air as a glowing line of light streaks across the night sky overhead and impacts somewhere in the Podunkville suburbs, landing with a muted "Crump". The hair of our heroes ruffles as a gentle blast of warm breeze whooshes past them from the epicentre of the fresh impact.

David had just been passing through the streets of Podunkville as he often had, it had been more or less a vacation for him. Such a town had no real use for a rogue agent gone vigilante so he simply was using the time to kick back and relax for a bit. Then he saw it, a hooded individual had entered a convenience store. David knew what was coming, he had seen it a hundred times before, it was always the same.

he slowly and smoothly pushed open the glass doors of the small corner shop, he watched the hooded fellow coolly as he browsed each of the isles in order. He followed with silent steps, he was a ghost in even in the bright light of the store, the crook would never see him coming.

After a few minutes of looking around without even picking up an item, the moment David had been waiting for, the hooded thug made for the candy bar shelf and sangged one, quickly shoving it in the pocket of his hoodie, he briskly made his way to the door. David adjusted his tie, cracked his neck to one side and shadowed the mans steps until he turned the corner just out of sight of the shops owner.

In a flash David grabbed the thief hand and wrenched it to the side, the man let out a yelp and his hood fell down revealing a face that couldn't be older then seventeen. *You seem to have a severe case of sticky fingers, easy fix no worries* and with a single twist he broke the kids pinky finger, the bone protruded to the outside and the kid squealed in a pitch that could nearly shatter glass.

*The bone can be set and will heal, but the scar will remain forever, whenever you look it it I want you to remember the lesson you learned today* David said coolly

"It...it..it was just a candy bar" The hoodlum squeaked through ragged tears.

"Precisely" David replied.

As he left the boy to nurse his wound David saw a bright flash followed by a ground shaking boom. He adjusted his tie once more and calmly strode in its direction.

"Um," Jonathan said, turning to where James was watching the burning building with downright disturbing interest, "I don't suppose this is one of those towns that still has bomb shelters, is it? The sky's startin' to look real dangerous."

Logged

Nefarious? Nearly. Ne’er-do-well? Never! Neither nearly names this narrator. Naive and knowledgeable, notorious and inscrutable, this nascent Nero is known naturally as Neoadept.

"Right... well, for reasons I'd rather not be here when the public servants show up." Anton called out as he braced his back against the inside of the driver-side door. He put his feet onto the hunk of metal and the gave a hard push. The scrap slid out of Anton's car and crashed to the pavement along with the passenger door. "Hey Jim! It's gonna be dark soon. Why don't you let me give you ride into town and we see what's going on?"

While Jim thought it over, Anton got out of the car and hefted the broken door into the trunk. Glancing to the side toward the robotic policeman, Anton mumbled, "I oughta stuff you in here too, Robber."

Breaking his glance from the sky, James nodded. Looking around, he remembered that he had parked his chopper around back in what used to be the alley way but was now a part of ground zero, muttering, "****." He turned back to Anton and called.

"Two of these things in a night? You bet your ass I want to see what's going on." Walking past Jonathan once again he gave the detective a hard pat on the shoulder as he passed, "Cmon, dick, if you're world class maybe you'll solve it before we even get there, eh?" With a chuckle he continued towards Antons car, noting the heavy piece of machinery that had to come off it first. Sliding right in to the passenger seat, James noticed the red and blue approaching and called back, "Hey, I'm not sitting in this open air carriage ride just so I can be questioned later, lets get to that other fireball!"

"No shelter, I guess," Jon muttered as he made his way back to MIC. "Get us out of here," he hissed as he threw a leg over the bike's seat and gripped the handlebars.

"I'm afraid not, Jonathan," MIC replied coolly as it turned away from the destroyed building and made for Anton's car. "I've calculated the spread of the debris field, and the object's main component most likely went this way."

"And we care because...?" Jon asked as they passed the car headed for the back of the parking lot, following a trail of broken glass and cratered pavement.

"Because we're broke," the bike lied. It was curious about the satellite phenomena, but more to the point it had to scrub all the evidence of it's involvement from the affair. "Pick it up," it commanded as they came upon the surprisingly small core of the downed orbiter.

With most of the casing and numerous components stripped away, it was no larger than a beach ball and, despite his grumbling, Jon had little trouble picking it up.

Logged

Nefarious? Nearly. Ne’er-do-well? Never! Neither nearly names this narrator. Naive and knowledgeable, notorious and inscrutable, this nascent Nero is known naturally as Neoadept.

"You coming along, Detective?" Anton called out to Jon, spying the hunk of tech in his hands. "You can play with that later, let's put your skills to the test. Town is just down this way." He pointed off down a long flat road toward the glimmering fires over in town. Evening was in full swing by this point and it would be dark soon. "Bring a flashlight!"

With a roar, Anton's car came to life and after a few backfires it was rolling down the road at high speed. Everything seemed more or less fine, though the ride was definitely more wobbly than it had been. James was buckled in tight and leaned away from the space where his door should have been. Anton's driving was, truthfully, not for the faint of heart... or anyone really.

SB-5 was about to assume the explosion was an isolated incident when a bright line cut through the air like a bullet. For the briefest moment there was a brilliant flash where it intersected the horizon, followed half a second later by a thunderous boom. That one was closer, he thought.

Uncertain, SB-5 quickly and fluidly unlocked the door, stepped outside, closed the door, and locked it again. He paused a for a millisecond or two, contemplating what action to take to best ensure his survival. Deciding to prepare for the worst, he walked calmly over to an old fifties-era fridge. He pulled on the rusted handle. The ground shook slightly as the sound of one massive hunk of metal hitting another permeated the air. The white door now opened, with a slight creak befitting of its age. He stepped inside, bending over in the tight space, and the door closed behind him. It would have been pitch black had he been limited to the narrow range of wavelengths humans were. Another metallic thud and the floor began descending beneath him.

A third thud later and the decent stopped. A row of old, noisy light bulbs turned on in succession, illuminating the small bunker. There were shelves lining both sides of a narrow walkway. On them were various mechanical parts and pieces, haphazardly filling up all the available space. At the end of the walkway sat a terminal with a single display. On the screen, displayed the whereabouts and a few key statistics on each of his robots.

Now, he thought, what is the best way to defend against objects falling from the sky?

One of the many, many problems that came with working for Dee Wing is that, ever so occasionally, reports would come in before anything actually happened. There were stories from other agents that they were sent into the field years before what they were investigating even happened.

Podunkville was fine. Nothing out of the ordinary, as ordinary as a small town in a fly-over state can be. Now he'd have to go through the awkward conversation that this man with the accent was, in fact, with Homeland Security and was here investigating something, no we can't tell you what, need to know basis, etc. etc.

That said, he thought as watched the sparse landscape go past the taxi window, it would be nice to have a few days off.

But that comforting thought evaporated when the taxi driver said "Wouldja look at that?" It looked like a shooting star to begin with, but became brighter. It hit somewhere just behind the horizon. Even this far away, the explosion could be heard. "Holy ****!"

Well, there was the explanation. "Keep going."

"You crazy? That was probably the rooskies firing the first shot!"

"Trust me, if that was a nuke, we'd be dead."

"Well, I ain't becoming a mutant. You can walk."

"Like hell I am. Keep going, if you like your job." He produced his not-technically-fake badge.

A few moments later, another bright light fell and hit the ground, this time much closer. Nigel was getting worried. Coming from space usually meant a Lovecraft-style anomaly, which he was not trained to deal with. He was very close to calling home, getting experts in, when he remembered the driver. "Did you see where that fell?"

"Yeah, it was close, I think."

"Get as close as you want. I want to see what that was."

The driver dropped him off several streets away, before speeding off in the opposite direction. When he got there, there was already a large crowd of people, murmuring amongst themselves. Thankfully, nobody seems to have approached the object. Gibbering fish-men were never fun to deal with, especially child-sized ones. Just as thankfully, it had hit a shop - what did they call them? A general store - that was closed for the night.

Standing on top of some rubble, he brought out the badge. "Ladies and gentlemen, please return to your homes. The authorities are dealing with this. Please remain calm." The crowd thinned, but there were still some people about. But the object didn't seem to be doing anything. If it continued to do that, the stragglers would just wonder away out of boredom.

He turned to face the glowing rubble. Dust was still settling, so he covered his mouth with his coat collar. Behind him he heard a car pull up. Somewhere deep inside himself he doubted it was the police. They don't usually backfire.